Craft - Introduction to Sync plugin

The Craft Sync plugin brings your design environment and InVision together like never before. Sync lets you send your designs into InVision instantly- no saving, exporting, dragging or dropping. Simply select your screens in Sketch or Photoshop, create or choose the prototype you want to sync to, and easily import all of your screens into InVision!

If you’re currently using InVision Sync to get your Sketch or Photoshop designs into InVision, you should now be using Craft Sync. Over the next few months, we’ll be improving Craft Sync functionality. See below for known limitations, and stay tuned for improvements.

Sketch Craft Sync supports SSO and Private Cloud login; once you click Sign in to InVision, click Enterprise sign in to enter your enterprise domain name. If your domain requires SSO login, after you enter your domain name, you will be asked for your SSO login credentials. If your domain supports optional SSO login, after you enter your domain name, you can enter your email address and password to log in, or click Or sign in with SSO to use your SSO login credentials.

If you don’t yet have an InVision account, sign up for one at InVisionApp.com. Once you complete signing up for an account, you can go back to Sketch or Photoshop and login to the plugin with your new InVision credentials.

Sync Setup - Photoshop for Windows

Once you open the installer, click Yes to allow the app to make changes to your device.

Click Install.

Wait while Craft installs on your computer.

Once the download is complete, click Finish.

If Photoshop is already open on your machine, restart it.

To open the plugin, in Photoshop go to Windows > Extensions > Sync.The first time you relaunch Photoshop, it may take up to one minute before the Sync displays in the panel.

The first time you open the Sync plugin, you may receive a Windows Security Alert modal pop up. We recommend checking both private and public networks, then click Allow access.

Back in the Craft Sync panel in Photoshop, click Sign in to InVision. If you don’t yet have an InVision account, click Create Account, which will take you through the sign-up flow at InVisionApp.com. Once you complete signing up for an account, you can go back to Sketch or Photoshop and login to the plugin with your new InVision credentials.

When an update to Craft Sync for Windows is available, you will see the modal below and need to click Update now. You will be required to update when a new version is available. Once you update, you’ll also need to restart Photoshop.

Syncing to a prototype

Select which prototype you’d like to sync your screens to by choosing your prototype from the list, or use the search field to find it by name.

To sync screens to a new prototype, click Create a new prototype, enter the new prototype name (you cannot use the name of a pre-existing prototype for a new prototype) and select which account you’d like it under, then click Create Prototype.

When creating a new prototype, enter the prototype name, device type, and the account you'd like the new prototype under.

When choosing an existing prototype to sync to, you’ll see your unarchived prototypes from both personal and Enterprise accounts. You also have access to prototypes you’ve been given Contributor/Collaborator access.

If you have synced from the active document before, the plugin will default to the last prototype you synced to. You can change this at any time.

Selecting artboards to sync

The Sync plugin exports and uploads artboards from your design as screens in your InVision prototype. You can either sync all artboards from a page or selected artboards. If you chose Only selected artboards, select which artboards you want to sync.

In Sketch, you can also use the following keyboard shortcuts to sync:

Control-Shift-A to sync all artboards from the active page

Control-Shift-S to sync selected artboards

In Photoshop, you’ll also be able to select the export pixel density (1x or 2x) from the project selector screen.

Initiating syncing

Once you’ve selected your prototype and whether you’d like to sync all artboards on an active page or only selected artboards, click Sync to InVision.

To exclude an artboard from syncing, you can place a minus sign (-) in front of the artboard name:

All screens sent to InVision with Craft Sync for Sketch or Photoshop are compatible with Inspect. Any layer marked as exportable in Sketch will be available within Inspect and in the Assets tab in all formats/sizes defined within Sketch's export panel.

As your sync takes place, you’ll be able to view the progress under the sync button:

Once syncing is complete, you’ll see a green check mark when your prototype was last synced, and an Open button to go directly to your prototype dashboard in InVision:

Note: The current build does not make a share link available. That functionality will be added in an upcoming release.

Stopping an active sync

Stop an active sync by hovering over the sync circle progress indicator in the plugin’s footer and pressing the X icon. Artboards that have already successfully uploaded will remain in your prototype even if you stop the sync in mid-progress.

Changing your sync settings

Sketch settings

In Sketch, click the cogwheel at the top right of your Craft Sync plugin to open the settings modal. From here, you’ll be able to log out, change the export density of your screens, or send us feedback.

Photoshop settings

When using Craft Sync for Photoshop, click the cogwheel to log out of the account or send us feedback.

Selecting a density will export the artboard at the selected density. If 2x is selected, a 500x500 artboard will be exported and uploaded at twice the size (1000x1000), but displayed in your prototype at 500x500. Alternatively, you can export at 1x.

Sketch’s density setting will up-res the image and Photoshop’s density setting just allows you to define at what density you designed the artboard.

Syncing your artboards via Craft Sync

Craft Sync for Sketch

When you sync your artboards with Craft Sync, InVision matches your artboards to screens based on the underlying screen filename. InVision also creates a one-to-one sync relationship between the artboard and screen so that you can rename your artboard, and will continue to sync it to the existing screen in InVision.

Make sure that each artboard has a unique name—otherwise, only the last artboard listed in your Sketch file with a duplicate name will sync.

Can I rename my artboard?Once you’ve synced an artboard to InVision, a one-to-one sync relationship is created between the artboard and your screen in InVision so that you can rename that artboard in Sketch, and it will continue to sync to the original screen.

Can I rename my Sketch file?You can rename your Sketch file, and your artboards will continue to sync to your existing screens. Please note, if you rename your Sketch file and rename your artboards in one swoop, that will result in new screens instead of syncing to your existing screens. If you need to rename your Sketch file and your artboards, we’d recommend renaming your Sketch file, syncing all artboards via Craft, then renaming your artboards, and continuing to sync (or vice versa).

Craft Sync for Photoshop

When syncing artboards from Photoshop via Craft Sync, screens are updated based on the artboard name matching the underlying filename for the screen in InVision. Screen replacement when renaming an artboard is not supported.

The Sync plugin exports and uploads artboards from your design as screens in your InVision prototype. If you're working with a legacy Photoshop project, in order to use Craft Sync you'll need to convert your layer groups to artboards first. You can do this by left-clicking on a layer group in your non-artboard Photoshop file, then select the option to convert that layer group to an artboard.

You can either sync all artboards from a page or selected artboards. If you chose Only selected artboards , select which artboards you want to sync.

Known Limitations

Unsyncing: At this time, you can’t unsync. You can switch to a different prototype, but there is currently no way to unsync screens sent to a prototype. You would need to overwrite them manually or delete them in your InVision prototype dashboard.

Sharing: The current build does not make a share link available directly from Craft Sync. That functionality will be added in an upcoming release.

Photoshop density: Sketch’s density setting will up-res the image and Photoshop’s density setting just allows you to define at what density you designed the artboard.

Assets: Craft Sync for Photoshop will generate assets for export from any layers with names ending in .png, .gif, or .jpg only.